Shine Your Light on Me (7 page)

Aria hadn’t been aware of how they had crippled him. There were many rumors, and of course, this had been one of them. Mickey never mentioned it, neither did his boys. She thought deep inside her husband was grateful for the actions they’d taken against Jack. There had been bad blood between the two of them before she had come along.

Deep in thought, it took her a second to realize that she’d heard the front door open.

The temperature dropped in the house. The breeze coming in from the window billowed the curtains. There were many occasions when a moment’s hesitation had cost other people life or limb, but she had never experienced anything like that.

The front door shut.

She didn’t have time to put the photos back as Pine had arranged them, let alone replace the drawers and escape the room. She could leave it all as it was and dive out the window but things had been building to a head since she became part of the O’Connell clan. And seeing Pine pawing at Jessica a little over an hour ago helped her make her choice. She’d stand and face him and damn the consequences.

She pulled her cell phone from her pocket and dialed Mitch’s number.

She heard Pine’s footsteps in the hall, headed toward the room, and she heard Mitch say to leave a message. She began to panic, took a deep breath and squared her shoulders, casting her gaze left and right for anything she could use as a weapon. Everything had changed tonight and chances were they were about to change further.

She expected Mitch to call her back at any second and clutched her cell tightly. Pine was drawn by the light, she realized; he had left it off before he went out on his four-wheeler. She wondered which knife he had on him. She wondered if he’d kill her there, and if so, how he’d be able to hide it.

No, that train of thought wouldn’t work. She’d claw his eyes out, bite him, mark him. They’d all know. He already had a lump on his forehead that she’d given him. She would give him as many more as she could before she parted ways with this life.

She dialed Mitch’s number again when she heard Pine pause in the hall, probably listening for the sound of a presence in his room.

The call went to voice mail. She said, “Pine is molesting your daughter. I love her and I love you, but you need to stop your brother...”

And then she hung up with tears in her eyes, with her hands shaking uncontrollably, and he was there in the doorway, she could see him through the mist, but it was Elroy’s voice that said, “What are you doing in here?”

She wiped her eyes with the heel of her hand and composed herself the best she could and laughed in relief.

Elroy frowned. He said, “We have to put that stuff back before he comes home.”

• • •

After planting the bombs, Bobby snuck out of the school the way he’d entered it. The night felt heavier, colder, the rain from earlier had turned to snow and was falling so fast he couldn’t see ten feet in front of him. For a second he feared that he’d lose his sense of direction and stumble off into the ditch, or into the forest behind the school, or walk straight into the wall. But his instincts, he told himself anyway, were sharp. He had nothing to worry about. The deed was done, now all there was to do—whether inside the water tower, or out in the dead, wet night—was wait for morning.

How difficult would it be to sleep when you knew that you were finishing what others had started? He couldn’t imagine he’d sleep at all. It wasn’t like he was going to be there with them as they died. Watching, yes, waiting for the emergency responders, but that would be easy. It wouldn’t take long and it’d all be over. They’d write books about him, they’d look into his life and his father’s life, and they’d find things to feed the media frenzy. There would be outrage and tears for children and teachers.

And what would his mother think? Forget it. He knew what she’d think and he didn’t have the energy to dwell on it.

He slipped in the snow and caught himself and grew angry. Stupid weather. If it was still going like this in the morning they’d cancel school and he couldn’t have that. It was a consideration he hadn’t planned for. Should have made the bombs detonate by remote control instead of timers, but he didn’t know anything about remote controls and he would have worried that someone’s cell phone, or something else, would have set them off anyway.

The ground disappeared beneath his right foot and he pitched forward, his arms pinwheeling backwards, his breath pluming, and a short, sharp cry exploding from his throat.

He hit the ground and rolled, and snow and water wet his neck and cheeks and hands.

He lay there for a second, unhurt, but startled. The sky was a vast white nothingness.

Bobby sat up, the seat of his pants wet. He’d been going too deep into his own head, which he felt had always been one of his greatest strengths and most massive flaws.

He dug his fingers into the frozen grass beneath him and got up and shook himself off like a wet dog. The cold clung to him. He saw something in the snow straight ahead, just a dark shape. He stepped toward it cautiously, one hand out in front of him, trying to distinguish what the shape might be. It was nearly five feet tall, blurred, squared off.

His imagination led him down a path where he had stumbled into a graveyard and he knew that what he’d find was a headstone with his name on it, the date of his birth, the day of his death, the epigraph reading:
He lived a bit too long
...

But the shape moved and a voice said from beyond the curtain of snow Bobby was parting, ten feet away now, “You up to some kind of mischief, Bobby?”

“Who’s there?”

“It’s Pine.”

“What do you want?”

“Saw you fall, wondered if you were hurt.”

“I’m okay,” Bobby said. “Thanks.”

“What are you doing out on a night like this?”

“Just walking.”

Pine turned on the headlight of his four-wheeler and it cut through the darkness easy enough, made the snowflakes glisten and sparkle. It was kind of beautiful, Bobby thought, he thought Cindy would have liked it, but then Pine said, “You need a ride somewhere?”

“I appreciate it, but no thanks. I ain’t got far to go.”

“You hate as much as the next person, don’t you?”

“Excuse me?”

“Are you afraid of me?”

“Everybody is.”

“I’m talking about you, as an individual.”

He wasn’t sure what Pine wanted him to say. All Bobby wanted was to go home and change into a dry pair of clothes and set his alarm and curl up in a blanket for a few hours before he made the trek back to the water tower. That was if the snow let up and he could find his way. He still had no idea where he was; Pine rode his four-wheeler wherever he felt like.

“You hear me, Bobby?”

“I’m afraid of you, so what?”

“Good,” Pine said, “you should be. Especially when it’s just me and you out here, all alone, and both of us concealed. It leads a man to wonder, doesn’t it? If maybe, once we learn to keep our eyes open, how opportunities present themselves which allow us to use our gifts. Hone them, if you like. What do you think?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“I’m saying the two of us could be here right now because God wants us here. I was just praying for something to do because I was bored out of my skull, and then you stumble down that hill like a drunk and land almost in my lap. Like destiny, you know?”

Bobby knew and it scared the hell out of him.

He figured he should try and run, but then Pine was on his four-wheeler and there wasn’t outrunning that thing even if it’d been the middle of summer and he had all the energy of youth behind him.

He swallowed hard and said, “I’m not out to cause you any problems.”

“I want to hurt someone real bad,” Pine said.

“Hurt someone else.”

“I’d like to do that, but she’s not around and you are.”

“You do that, and then you should go into the school first thing in the morning and tell everybody there about it. They love hearing your stories.”

“Do they?”

“Sure.”

“That’s funny. I don’t ever tell anybody what I do because it’s none of their business and most of all it cheapens those experiences for me.”

“I’ve gotta get home, my dad’s expecting me.”

“Your dad and my dad are friends, aren’t they?”

“Well enough,” Bobby said.

He could see Pine chewing on his lip, and it made his blood chill in his veins, that moment before reaching a life-altering decision. If anyone had been able to ask him, he would have sworn that as the older boy sat there on that four-wheeler like some kind of hound from hell, Pine rubbed two fingers against a horn trying to break the skin on the center of his forehead. Bobby wanted to say, “You ain’t human. You haven’t ever been human...” But he couldn’t even form a word because his teeth were chattering and Pine started the four-wheeler and pulled up closer, giving Bobby a better look at him.

There was definitely a strange knot breaking like a horn through the skin just above his eyes. He kept touching it. He was wearing a Henley shirt, dark jeans, heavy boots. He was also sweating profusely despite the cold and his lack of a jacket.

He stared at Bobby and Bobby stared back until Pine said, “Since our fathers have an understanding, maybe I’ll give you a free pass.”

“That would be best for everybody.”

“You sure you don’t want a ride home? Climb on back behind me.”

“You’re sweating,” Bobby said.

“I’m always sweating, just burning up inside is all. It doesn’t hurt none.”

“Well, take care.”

“Same to you,” Pine said.

He drove off and Bobby let out a long sigh and felt like crying.

CHAPTER 4

It took Bobby an hour to find his way home through the dark and the snow. He hadn’t brought a flashlight because he didn’t want anyone to see him entering or leaving the school or the water tower. The lights were on in the living room. Both of his parents’ cars were in the driveway, his mother’s nearest the house. His clothing had ice in them, and his feet hurt, and so did his back from the fall. All he wanted to do was find an incredible warmth and slip quickly into sleep.

But first he had to enter the house without alerting his dad, and that was no easy task because his dad didn’t sit still for long, was always moving about the house like a tornado, sucking up everything in his path and spitting it out with devastating force.

He considered turning around and going back to the water tower now that the snow had lessened but he’d freeze to death up there in the utility room without dry clothing or a fire or a blanket or something warm to drink. When he was younger, he’d come in the house, his mom would sneak him a cup of hot cocoa sometimes, mostly winter nights just like this one. She never questioned where he’d been, what he’d done, she didn’t really talk much at all, just knew what he needed and provided it.

Bobby stared at the front door. This was the last place he wanted to be. He considered walking over to Cindy’s house but her parents didn’t like him and wouldn’t let him inside no matter what condition he was in. Anybody else, it would have worked, with the snow and water frozen to his face and his hands a dying red, and his eyes so startled and afraid. But, no, her parents didn’t give a damn who his father was, and if anything, they judged him even more severely because of it.

Birds of a feather and all that, he figured. If Cindy’s family had more money like his did then they’d be kissing his dad’s ass. Human nature. Her dad worked for a tire shop and her mom waitressed at a greasy spoon restaurant and both of them were constantly scowling. He didn’t like their company to begin with. They were miserable people. No wonder she wanted to make something of her life instead of repeating what they had done, the little they’d amounted to. Circumstances, people were always talking about that, but Bobby didn’t buy half of it because people did have a choice—hell, a
million
choices—about what they’d do with their lives both day-to-day and over decades.

If he could respect his father, or anyone else like him, for anything, it was that they worked the steps it took to get where they wanted to go instead of crying about how unfair the world was, how it was keeping them down, how if they’d had a lucky break like someone else they would have been in just as good of a position socially and financially.

Stupid people who thought that. Very few people had more opportunities. Those who made something of themselves usually weren’t afraid of risking it all to get where they wanted to go. His dad was like that, and in a way, he’d set an example for Bobby that would lead to his father’s death.

Thinking about that made him smile. Fucking ironic, he thought.

He approached the door and tried the handle. It was locked, of course. His father would make him knock, that was in him, to know where everything was, at all times. Bobby himself was like that sometimes. There wasn’t much to fear if you had a tight rein on all the things that mattered to you. But then those things suffered a slow suffocation, if you asked Bobby. Look at his mom. Twenty years of being under someone’s thumb, so trained that death itself couldn’t change her decisions for fear she’d upset the balance his father had set.

This was all almost over though, so fuck’em. His mom would be better off. Maybe a little lost at first without his dad telling her what to do, and how to do it, and correcting her every misstep, but she’d be better off in the long run. She’d find somebody like Cindy would, somebody who wanted the best for both of them.

He swallowed hard, felt the tears burning his eyes.

Bobby hadn’t realized how much he’d miss them: Cindy and his mother.

He didn’t have any illusions. After he eliminated the emergency services, he’d have maybe three or four hours of life left. Someone would call the State Police, and then there would be swat teams, guys who knew where he was perched, and they’d take his last breath as easily as he’d taken others, as easy as Pine could. Men made for such behavior. Yet the women would be better off, no denying that. Cindy would find somebody else, somebody who had something more to offer, some guy who could help her get out of this hell hole and design a life worth living; his mom would find a decent guy who maybe didn’t have the social standing her husband now had, but he’d be a man who held her at night and listened to her and didn’t blow his stack over nothing, like his dad usually did.